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THE UNION. 



SPEECH 



OF 



WILLIAM H. SEWARD 

n 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, 




JANUARY 12, 1861. 



The Senate Uaviiig resumed the consideration of the 
Bpecial message of the President of the United States, 
comjnunicated on the 9th of January, in reference to the 
ftitf of the Union— 

^I^. SEWARD said: 

:.ir. Presidcnt: Congress adjourned last sum- 
iner amid auspices of national abundance, con- ; 
lentment, tranquillity, and happiness. It has, 
i-cassemblcd this winter in the presence of de- 
rangement of business and disturbance of public* 
«s well as private credit, and in the face of sedi- 
tious combinations to overthrow the Union. The | 
niarui is appalling; for Union is not more the 
body than liberty is the soul of the nation. The 
American citizen has been accustomed to believe 
thf. Republic immortal. He shrinksfrom the sight 
•»f convulsions indicative of its sudden death. 
The report of our condition has gone over the i 
seas; and we who have so long and with much 
coniolacency studied the endless agitations ofi 
aociiity in the Old World, believing ourselves ex- 1 
empt from such disturbances, now, in our turn, | 
seem to be falling into a momentous and disas-i 
i.rnns revolution. I 

I. know how difTicult it is to decide, amid so 
mn -y and so various counsels,' what ought to be 
and even what can be done. Certainly, however, 
It id time for every Senator to declare himsqjf. I 
vlu refore, following the example of the noble Sen- 
ator from Tenness.c, [Mr. Johnson,] avow my 
adh'^rence to the yiiion in its integrity and wuh 
a'l IIS parts, with my friends, with my party, with 
my State, with my country, or without either, as 
they may deteriniiie,.in every event, whether oi 
peaee or of war, with' every consequence of honor 
or dishonor, of life or death. Although I lament 
theocciteion, I hail with cheerfulness the duty of 
lifti'ig up my voice among distracted debates, for 
^^ whole country and its inestimable Union. 
Hitherto the exhibitions of spirit and resolu- 
tion here, as elsewhere, have been chiefly made 
on the side of disunion. I do not regret this. Dis- 
un'.n is so unexpected and unnatural that it must 
plainly reveal itself before its presence can be 
lenlized. I like best, also, the courage that pses 
Bli'.vly under the pressure of severe provocation. 



If it be a Christian duty to forgive to the stranger 
even seventy timessevcn offenses, it is the highest 
patriotism to endure without complaint the pas- 
sionate waywardness of political brethren so long 
as there is hope that they may come to a better 
mind. 

I think it is easy to pronounce what measures 
or conduct will not save the Union. 1 agree with 
the honorable Senator from North Carolina [Mr. 
Clingman] that mere eulogiums will not save it. 
Yet I think that as prayer brings us nearer to God, 
though it cannot move Him toward us, so there 
is healing and saving virtue in every word of de- 
votion to the Unionlhat is spoken, and in every 
sigh that its danger draws forth. I know, at 
least, that, like irath, it derives strength from 
every irreverent act that is committed and every 
blasphemous phrase that is uttered against it. 

The Union cannot be saved by mutual crinfii- 
nations concerning our respective shares of re- 
sponsibility for the present evils. He whose con- 
science acquits him will naturally be slow to 
accuse others whose cooperation he needs. His- 
tory only can adjust the great account. 
t A continuance of the debate on the constitu- 
tional power of Congress over the subject of sla- 
very in the Territories will not save the Union. 
The opinions of parties and sections on that ques- 
tion have become dogmatical, and it is this cir- 
cumstance that has produced the existing alien- 
ation. A truce, at least during the debate on the 
Union, is essential to reconciliation. 

The Union cannot' be saved by proving that 
secession is illegal or unconstitutional. Persons 
bent on that fearful step willnot stand long enough 
on forms of law to be dislodged-, and loyal men do 
not need such narrow ground to stand upon. 

I fear that little more will be gained from dis- 
cussing the right of the Federal Government to 
coerce seceding States into- obedience. It dis- 
union is to go on, this question will give place to 
the more practical one, whether many seceding 
States have a right to coerce the remaining mem- 
bers to acquiesce in a dissolution. 

I dread, as in my innermost soul I abhor, civit 
war I do not know what the Union would be 






worth if saved by the use of the sword. Yet, for 
all this, I do not agree with those wiio, with a 
desire to avert that great calamity, advise a con- 
ventional or unopposed separation, with a view 
to wliat they call a reconstruction. It is enough 
for nie, first, that in this plan, destruction goe.s 
before reconstruction; and secondly, that the 
strength of the vase in which the hopes of the 
nation arc held consists chiefly in its remaining 
unbroken. 

Congressional compromises are not likely to 
save the Union. I know, indeed, that tradition 
favors this form of remedy. But it is essential 
to its success, in any case, that there be found a 
preponderating mass of citizens, so far neutral on 
the issue which separates parties, that they can 
intervene, strike down clashing weapons, and 
compel an accommodation. Moderate concessions 
are not customarily asked by a force with its guns 
in battery; nor are liberal concessions apt to be 
given by an opposing force not less confident of 
its own right and its own strength. I think, also, 
that there is a prevailing conviction that legislative 
compromises which sacrifice honestly cherished 
principles, while they anticipate future exigencies, 
even if they do not assume extra-constitutional 
powers, are less sure to avert imminent evils than 
they are certain to produce ultimately even greater 
dangers. 

Indeed, Mr. President, I think it will be wise I 
to discard two prevalent ideas or prejudices,! 
namely: first, that the Union is to be saved by ! 
somebody in particular; and secondly, that it is | 
to be saved by some cunning and insincere com- 1 
pact of pacification. If I remember rightly, I said | 
something like this here so long ago as 1850, and I 
afterwards in 1854. I 

The present danger discloses itself in this form. 
Discontented citizens have obtained political 
power in certain States, and they are using this 
authority to overthrow the Federal Government. 
They delude themselves with a belief that the 
State power they have acquired enables them to 
discharge themselves of allegiance to the whole 
Republic. The President says that no State 
has a right to secede, but we have no consti- 
tutional power to make war against a State. 
The dilemma results from an assumption that 
those who, in such a case, act against the Federal 
Government, act lawfully as a Slate; although 
manifestly they have perverted the power of the 
State to an unconstitutional purpose. A class of 
politicians in New England set up this theory 
and attempted to practice upon it in our war with 
Great Britain. Mr. JeOerson did not hesitate to 
say that States must be kept within their consti- 
tutional sphercby impulsion, if they could not be 
held there by attraction. Secession was then 
held to be inadmissible in the face of a public ene- 
my. But if it is untenable in one case, it is neces- 
sarily so in all others. I fully admit the origin- 
ality, the sovereignty, and the independence of the 
several States within their sphere. But I hold 
the Federal Government to be equally original, 
sovereign, and independent within its splierc.' 
And the government of the State can no more" 
absolve the people residing within its limits from 
allegiance to the Union, than the Government of 



I the Union can absolve them from allegiance to 
I the State. The Constitution of the United States, 
and the laws made in pursuance thereof, are the' 
' supreme lav/ of the land, paramount to all legis- 
j lation of the States, whethcrmade under the Con- 
jstitution, or by even their organic conventions, 
i The Union can be dissolved, not by secession' 
j with or without armed force, b«t only by the vol- 
I untary consent of the people of the United States 
) collected in the manner prescribed by the Consti- 
tution of the United States. 

Congress, in the present case, ought not to be 
impassive. It ought, if it can, to redress any 
real grievances of the offended States, and then it 
ought to supply the President with all the means 
necessary to maintain the Union in the full exhi- 
bition and discreet exercise of its authority. Be- 
yond this, with the proper activity on the part of 
the Executive, the responsibility of saving the 
Union belongs to the people, and they are abun- 
dantly competent to discharge it. 

i propose, therefore, with great deference, to 
address myself to the country upon the moment- 
ous Subject, asking a hearing, not less from the 
people within what are called the seceding, than 
from those who reside within the adhering States. 
Union isan old, fixed, settled habit of the Amer- 
ican people, resulting from convictions of its 
necessity, and therefore not likely to be hastily 
discarded. The early States, while existingas colo- 
nies, were combined, though imperfectly, through 
ti common allegiance to the British Crown. When 
that allegiance ceased, no one was so presumptu- 
ous as to suppose political existence compatible 
with disunion; and, therefore, on the same day 
that they declared themselves independent, they 
proclaimed themselves also confederated States. 
Experience in war and in peace, from 1776 until 
1787, only convinced them of the necessity of con- 
verting that loose Confederacy into a more perfect 
and a perpetual Union. They acted with a cool- 
ness very different from the intemperate conduct 
of those who now on one side threaten, and those 
who on the other rashly defy disunion. They con- 
sidered the continuance of the Union as a subject 
comprehending nothing less than the safety and 
welfare of all the parts of which the country was 
composed, and the fixle of an empire in many re- 
spects the most interesting in the world. I enter 
upon the subject of continuing the Union now, 
deeply impressed with the same generous and 
loyal conviction. How could it be otherwise, 
when, insteadof only thirteen, the country is now 
confiposed of thirty-three parts; and the empire 
embraces, instead of only four million, no less 
than thirty million inhabitants. 

The founders of the Constitution moreover 
regarded the Union as no mere national or Amer- 
ican interest. On the contrary, they confessed 
with deep sensibility that it seemed to them to 
have been reserved for the people of this country 
to decide whether societies of men are really capa- 
ble of establishing good government upon reflec- 
tion and choice, or whether they are forever des- 
tined to depend for their political constitutions on 
accident and force. They feared, therefore, that 
their failure to continue and perfect the Union 
would be a misfortune to the nations. How much 



more, sir, would its overthrow now be a calamity 
tx) mankind ! 

Some form of government is indispensable here 
as elsewhere. Whatever form we have, every 
individual citizen and every State must cede to it 
some natural rights, to invest the Government 
with the requisite power. The simple question, 
therefore, for us now to decide, while laying aside 
all pique, passion, and prejudice, is: whether it 
conduces more to the interests of the people of 
this country to remain, for the general purposes 
of peace and war, commerce inland and foreign, 
postal communications at home and abroad, the 
care and disposition of the public domain, coloni- 
zation, the organization and admission of new 
States, and, generally, the enlargement of empire, 
one nation under our present Constitution, than it 
would to divide themselves into separate Confed- 
eracies or States. 

Our country remains now as it was in 1787 — 
composed not of detached and distant Territories, 
but of one whole well-connected and fertile region 
lying within the temperate zone, with climates 
and soils hardly more various than those of France 
or of Italy. This slight diversity quickens and 
amplifies manufacture and commerce. Our rivers 
and valleys, as improved by art, furnish us a sys- 
tem of higiiways unequaied in the world. The 
different forms of labor, if slavery were not per- 
verted to purposes of political ambition, need not 
constitute an element of strife in the Confederacy. 
Notwithstanding recent vehement expressions 
and manifestations of intolerance in some quarters, 
produced by in tense partisan excitement, we are, in 
fact, a homogeneous people, chiefly of one stock, 
with accessiuns well assimilated. We have, prac- 
tically, only one language, one religion, one sys- 
tem of Government, and manners and customs 
common to all. Why, then, shall we not remain 
henceforth, as hitherto, one people? 

The first object of every human society is safety 
or security, for wliich, if need be, they will, and 
they must, sacrifice every other. This security 
is of two kinds: one, exemption from foreign 
aggression and influence; the other, exemption 
from domestic tyratiny and sedition. 
^ Foreign wars come from cither violations of 
treaties or domestic violence. The Union has, 
thus fur, proved itself an almost perfect shield 
against such wars. The United States, continu- 
allyenlarging their di|ilomaticacquaintance,have 
now treaties with France, the Netherlands, Great 
Britain, Sweden, Prussia, Spain, Russia, Den- 
mark, Mexico, Brazil, Austria, Turkey, Chili, 
Siam, Muscat, Venezuela, Peru, Greece, Sar- 
dinia, Ecuador, Hanover, Portugal, New Gran- 
ada, ilcsse Cassel, Wurtemburg, China, Bava- 
ria, Saxony, Nassau, Switzerland, Mcckienburg- 
Schwerin, Guatemala, the Hawaian Islands, 
San Salvador, Borneo, Costa Rica, Bremen, 
the Argentine Confederation, Loo Choo, Japan, 
Brunswick, Persia, Baden, Belgium, and Para- 
guay. Nevertheless, the United States, within 
their entire existence under the Federal Constitu- 
tion, have had flagrant wars with only four States, 
two of which were insignificant Powers, on the 
coast of Barbary, and have had direct hostilities, 
amounting to reprisals, against only two or three 



more; and they are now at peace with the whole 
world. If the Union should be divided into only 
two Confederacies, each of them would need to 
make as many treaties as we have now; and, of 
course, would be liable to give as many causes 
of war as we now do. But we know, from the 
sad experience of other nations, that disintegra- 
tion, once begun, inevitably continues until even 
the greatest empire crumbles into many parts. 
Each Confederation that shall ultimately arise out 
of the ruin of the Union will have necessity for 
as many treaties as we now have, and will incur 
liabilities for war as often as we now do, by 
breaking them. It is the multiplication of treaties, 
and the want of confederation, that makes war 
the normal condition of society in Western 
Europe and in Spanish America. It is union 
that, notwithstanding our world -wide intercourse, 
makes peace the habit of the American people. 

I will not descend so low as to ask whether new 
confederacies would be able or willing to bear 
the grievous expense of maintaining the diplo- 
matic relations which cannot be dispensed with 
except by withdrawing from foreign commerce. 

Our Federal Government is better able to avoid 
giving just causes of war than several confedera- 
cies, because it can conform the action of all the 
States to compacts. It can have only one con- 
struction, and only one tribunal to pronounce that 
construction, of every treaty. Local and tempo- 
rary interests and passions, or personal cupidity 
and ambition, can drive small confederacies or 
States more easily than a great Republic into in- 
discreet violation.s of treaties. 

The United States being a great and formidable 
Power, can always secure favorable and satisfac- 
tory treaties. Indeed, every treaty we have was 
voluntarily made. Small confederacies or States 
must take such treaties as they can get, and give 
whatever treaties are exacted. A humiliating, or 
even an unsatisfactory treaty, is a chronic cause 
of foreign war. 

The chapter of wars resulting from unjustifi- 
able causes would, in case of division, amplify 
itself in proportion to the number of new con- 
federacies and their irritability. Our disputes 
wirfh Great Britain about Oregon, the boundary 
of Maine, the patriot insurrection in Canada, and 
the Island of San Juan; the border strifes be- 
tween Texas and Mexico, the incursions of the 
late William Walker into Mexico and Central 
America; all these were cases in which war was 
prevented only by the imperturbability of the 
Federal Government. 

This Government not only gives fewer causes 
of war, whether just or unjust, than smaller con- 
federacies would; but it always has a greater 
ability to accommodate them by the exercise of 
more coolness and courage, the use of more vari- 
ous and more liberal means, and the display, if 
need be, of greater force. Every one knows how 
placable we ourselves are in controversies with 
Great Britain, France, and Spain; and yet how 
exacting we have been m our intercourse with 
New Granada, Paraguay, and San Juan de Nic- 
aragua. 

Mr. President, no one will dispute our fore- 
fathers' maxim, that the common safety of all is 



the safety of eacli of thi^ States. While they re- 
main united, the Federal Government combines 
all the materials and all the forces of the several 
States; organizes their defenses on one general 
princrple; harmonizes and assimilates them with 
one system; watches for them with a single eye, 
which it turns in all directions, and moves all 
jigenls under the control of one executive head. 
A nation so constituted is safe against assault or 
even insult. 

War produces always a speedy exhaustion of 
money and a severe strain upon credit. The 
treasuries and credits of small confederacies would 
often prove inadequate. Those of the Union are 
always ample. 

I have thus far kept out of view the relations 
which must arise between the confederacies them- 
selves. They would be small and inconsiderable 
nations bordering on each other, and therefore, 
according to all political philosophy, natural ene- 
mies. In addition to the many treaties which each 
must make with foreign Powers, and the causes 
of war which they would give by violating them, 
each of the confederacies must also maintain 
treaties with all tlie others, and so be liable to give 
them frequent oflense. They would necessarily 
have different interests resulting from their estab- 
lishment of different policies of revenue, of min- 
ing, manufactures, and navigation, of immigra- 
tion, and perhaps the slave trade. Each would 
stipulate with foreign nations for advantages 
peculiar to itself and injurious to its rivals. 

If, indeed, it were necessary that the Union 
should be broken up, it would be in the last de- 
gree important that the new confederacies to be 
formed should be as nearly as possible equal in 
strength and power, that mutual fear and mutual 
respect might inspire them with caution against 
mutual olfense. But such equality could not long 
be maintained; one confederacy would rise in 
the scale of political importance, and the others 
would view it thenceforward with envy and ap- 
prehension. Jealousies would bring on frequent 
and retaliatory wars, and all these wars, from 
the peculiar circumstances of the confederacies, 
would have the nature and character of civil 
war. Dissolution, therefore, is, for the peopl^of 
this country, perpetual civil war. To mitigate it, 
and obtain occasional rest, what else could they 
accept but the system of adjusting the balance of 
power which has obtained in Europe, in which 
the few strong nations dictate the very terms on 
which all the others shall be content to live, i 
When this hateful system should fail at last, for- 
eign nations would intervene, now in favor of one 
and then in aid of another; and thus our country, 
having expelled all European Powers from the ' 
continent, would relapse into an aggravated form 
of its colonial experience, and, like Italy, Turkey, 
India, and China, become the theater of transat- I 
lantic intervention and rapacity. i 

If, however, we grant to the new confederacies ' 
an exemption from complications among each' 
other and with foreign States, still there°is too 
much reason to believe that not one of them could \ 
long maintain a republican form of government. ' 
Universal suffrage and the absence of a stand- 
ing army are essential to the republican system. ' 



The world has yet to see a single self-sustaining 
State of that kind, or even any confederation of 
such States, except our own. Canada leans on 
Great Britain not unwillingly, and Switzerland is 
guarantied by interested monarchical States. Our 
own experiment has thus far been successful; be- 
cause, by the continual addition of new States, the 
influence of each of the members of the Union is 
constantly restrained and reduced. No one, of 
course, can foretell the way and manner of travel; 
but history indicates with unerring certainty the 
end which the several confederacies would reach. 
Licentiousness would render life intolerable; and 
they would sooner or later purchase tranquillity 
and domestic safety by the surrender of liberty, 
and yield themselves up to the protection of md- 
itary despotism. 

Indulge me, sir, in one or tv/o details under this 
head. First, it is only sixty days since this dis- 
union movement began; already those who are 
engaged in it have canvassed with portentous free- 
dom the possible recombinations of the States when 
dissevered, and the feasible alliances of those re- 
combinations with European nations; alliances as 
unnatural, and which would prove ultimately as 
pestilential to society here as that of the Tlasca- 
lans with the Spaniard, who promised them re- 
venge upon their ancient enemies, the Aztecs. 

Secondly. The disunion movement arises partly 
out of a dispute over the common domain of the 
United States. Hitherto the Union has confined 
this controversy within the bounds of political 
debate by referring it, with all other national ones, 
to the arbitrament of the ballot-box. Does any 
one suppose that disunion would transfer the 
whole domain to either party, or that any other 
umpire than war would, after dissolution, be 
invoked? 

Thirdly. This movement arises, in another 
view, out of the relation of African slaves to the 
domestic population of the country. Freedom is 
to them, as to all mankind, the chief object of 
desire. Hitherto, under the operation of the 
Union, they have practically remained ignorant 
of the controversy, especially of its bearing on 
themselves. Can we hope that flagrant civil war 
shall rage among ourselves in their very presence, 
and yet that they will remain stupid and idle spec-' 
tators ? Does history furnish us any satisfactory 
instruction upon the horrors of civil war among 
a people so brave, so skilled in arms, so earnest 
in conviction, and so intent in purpose, as wo are: 
Is it a mere cliimcra which suggests an aggrava- 
tion of those horrors beyond endurance when, on 
either side, there shall occur the intervention of 
an uprising ferocious African slave population of 
four, or'six, perhaps twenty million.' 

The opinions of mankind change, and with them 
the policies of nations. One hundred years ago 
all the commercial European States were engaged 
in transferring negro slaves from Africa to this 
hemisphere. To-day all those States are firmly 
set in hostility to the extension and even to the 
practice of slavery. Opposition to it takes two 
forms: one European, which is simple, direct ab- 
olition, effected, if need be, by compulsion; the 
other American, which seeks to arrest the African 
slave trade, and resist the entrance of domestic 



slavery into Territories where it is yet unknown, 
while it leaves the disposition of existing slavery 
to the considerate action of the States by which 
it is retained. It is the Union that restricts the 
opposition to slavery in this country within these 
limits. If dissolution pn.'vail, what guarantee shall 
there be against the full development here of the 
fearful anil uncompromising hostility to slavery 
which elsewhere pervades the world, and of which 
the recent invasion of Virginia was an illustra- 
tion, and John Brown was the hero.' 

Mr. President, I have designedlydwelt solong 
on the probable efTecis of disunion upon the safety 
of the American people as to leave me little time 
to consider the other evils which must follow in 
its train. But practically, the loss of safety in- 
volves every other form of public calamity. When 
once the guardian angel has taken flight, every- 
thing is lost. 

Dissolution would not only arrest, but extin- 
guish the greatness of our country. Even if sep- 
arate. confederacies could exist and endure, they 
could severally preserve no share of the common 
prestige of the Union. If the constellation is to 
be broken up, the stars, whether scattered widely 
apart or grouped in smaller clusters, will thence- 
forth shed forth feeble, glimmering, and lurid 
lights. Nor will great achievements be possible 
for the new confederacies. Dissolution would 
signalize its triumph by acts of wantonness which 
would shock and astound the world. It would 
provincialize Mount Vernon and give this Capi- 
tol over to desolation at the very moment when 
^the dome is rising over our heads liiat was to be 

U crowned with the statue of Liberty. After this 
there would remain for disunion no actof stupen- 
. ■ dous infamy to be committed. No petty confed- 
eracy that shall follow the United Slates can pro- 
long, ore ven renew, the majestic drama of national 
progress. Perhaps it is to be arrested because its 
sublimity is incapable of continuance. Let it be 
so, if we have indeed become degenerate. After 
Washington, arul the inflexible Adams, Henry, 
and the peerless Hamilton, Jefferson, and the ma- 
jestic Clay, Webster, and the acute Calhoun, 
Jackson, the modijstTaylor, and Scott, who rises 
in greatness under the burden of years, and Frank- 
lin, and Fulton, and Whitney, and Morse, have 
all performed their parts, let ihc curtain fall! 

While listening to these debates, I have some- 
times forgotten myself ill marking their contrasted 
effects upon the page who customarily stands on 
the dais before me, and the venerable Secretary 
who sits bchiiul him. The youth exhibits in- 
tensebut pleased emotion in the excitement, while 
at every u-reverent word that is uttered against 
the Union the eyes of the aged man are suffused 
with tears. Let him weep no more. Rather 
rejoice, for yours has been a lot of rare felicity. 
You have seen and been a part of ail the great- 
ness of your country, the towering national great- 
ness of all the world. Weep only you, and weep 
with all the bitterness of anguish, who are just 
stepping on the threshold of life; for that great- 
ness perishes prematurely and exists not for you, 
nor for me, nor for any that shall come after 
us. 
The public prosperity! how could it survive 



the storm.' Its elements are industry in the cul- 
ture of every fruit; miningof all the metals; com- 
merce at home and on every sea; material im- 
provement that knows no obstacle and has no 
end; invention that ranges throughout the domain 
of nature; increase of knowledge as broad as the 
human mind can explore; perfection of art as 
high as human genius can reach; and social re- 
finement working for the renovation of the world. 
How could our successors prosecute these noble 
objects in the midst of brutalizing civil conflict.' 
What guarantees will capital invested for such 
purposes have, that #ill outweigh the premium 
offered by political and military ambition? What 
leisure will the citizen find for study, or invention, 
or art, under the reign of conscription; nay, what 
interest in them will society feel when fear and 
hate shall have taken possession of the national 
mind.' Let the miner in California take heed; for 
its golden wealth will become the prieeof the na- 
tion that can command the most iron. Let the 
borderer take care; for the Indian will again Idrk 
around his dwelling. Let the pioneer come back 
into our denser settlements; for the railriui,d, the 
post road, and the telegraph, advance not orte fur- 
long farther into the wilderness. With standing 
armies consuming the substance of our people on 
the land, and our Navy and our postal steamers 
withdrawn from the ocean, who will protect or 
respect, or who will even know byname our petty 
confederacies.' The American man-of-war is a 
noble spectacle. I have seen it enter an ancient 
port in the Mediterranean. All the world won- 
dered at it, and talked of it. Salvos of artillery, 
from forts and shipping in the harbor, saluted its 
flag. Princes and princesses and merchants paid 
it homage, and all the people blessed it as a har- 
binger of hope for their own ultimate freedom. I 
imagine now the same noble vessel again enter- 
ing the same haven. Theflagof thirty-three stars 
and thirteen stripes has been hauled down, and 
in its place a signal is run up, which flaunts the 
device of a lone star or a palmetto tree. Men ask, 
"Who is the stranger that thuS steals into our 
waters.'" The answer contemptously given is, 
" She comes from one of the obscure republics of 
North America. Let her pass on." 

Lastly, public liberty, our own peculiar liberty, 
must languish for a time, and then cease to live. 
And such a liberty I free movement everywhere 
through our own land and throughout the world; 
free speech, free press, free suffrage; the freedom 
of every subject to vote on every law, and for or 
against every agent who expounds, administers, 
or executes. Unstable and jealous confederacies, 
constantly apprehending assaults without and 
treason within, formidable only to eachotherand 
contemptible to all beside: how long will it be be- 
fore, on the plea of public safety, they will sur- 
render all this inestimable and unequaled liberty, 
and accept the hateful and intolerable espionage 
of military despotism.' 

And now, Mr. President, what is the cause for 
this sudden and eternal sacrifice of so much safety, 
greatness, happiness, and freedom .' Have foreign 
nations combined, and are they coming in rage 
upon us.' No. So far from being enemies, there 
is not a nation on earth that is not an interested, 



6 



admiring friend. Even Uie London Times, by no 
means partial to us, says: I 

" It is cuiite possiblR that the problem of a democratic ! 
republic may be .solved by its overthrow in a few days in a 
spirit of folly, selfishness, and short-sightedness." 

HastlicFederalGovernmcntbecome tyrannical ' 
or oppressive, or even rigorous or unsocial? Has 
the Constitution lost its spirit, and all at once | 
collap.sod into a lifeless letter.' No; the Federal; 
Government smiles more benignantly, and works i 
to day more beneficently than ever. The Consti- 
tution is even the chosen model for the organiza- 
tion of the newly rising cdhfederacies. | 

The occasion is the election of a President of 
the United States, who is unacceptable to a por- 
tion of the people. I state the case accurately. 
There was no movement of disunion before the 
ballots which expressed that choice were cast. 
Disunion began as soon as the result was an- 
nounced. The justification it assigned was that 
Abraham Lincoln had been elected, while the sus- 
(^Sfeiof either one of three other candidates would 
have been acquiesced in. Was the election ille- 
gal? ^p; it is unimpeachable. Is the candidate 
personally offensive? No; he is a man of unblem- 
ished virtue and amiable manners. Is an election 
of President an unfreqiieiU or extraordinary trans- 
action? No; we never had a Chief Magistrate 
otherwise designated than by such election, and 
that form of choice is renewed every four years. 
Does any one even propose to change the mode 
of appointing the Chief Magistrate? No; election 
by universal sufifrage, as modified by the Consti- 
tution, is the one crowning franchise of the Ameri- 
can people. To save it they would defy the world. 
Is it apprehended that the new President will usurp 
despotic powers.' No; while he is of all men the 
most unambitious, he is, by the partial success of 
those who opposed his election , subjected to such 
restraints that he cannot, without their consent, 
appoint a minister or even a police agent, nego- 
tiate a treaty, or procure the passage of a law, and 
can hardly draw a musket from tiie public arse- 
nals to defend his own person. 

What, then, is the ground of discontent? It is 
that the disunionisls did not accept as conclusive 
the arguments which were urged in behalf of the 
successful candidate in the canvass. This is all. 
Were their own arguments against him more sat- 
isfactory to his supporters ? Of course they were 
not; they could not be. Does the Constitution, 
in letter or spirit, require or imply that the argu- 
ments of one party shall be satisfactory to the 
other? No; that is impossible. What is the con- 
stitutional remedy for this inevitable dissatisfac- 
tion ? Renewed debate and ultimate rehearing in 
a subsequent election. Have the now successful 
majority perverted power to purposes of oppres- 
sion ? No; they have never before held power. 
Alas! how prone we are to undervalue privileges 
and blessings. How gladly, how proudly, would 
the people of any nation in Europe accept, on 
such terms as we enjoy it, the boon of electing a 
Chief Magistrate every four years by free, equal, 
and universal suflVagc! How thankfully would 
they cast aside all their own systems of govern- 
ment, and accept this Republic of ours, with all 
its shortcomings and its disappointments, maintain 



it with their arms, and cherish it in their hearts. 
Is it not the very boon for which tJiey supplicate 
God without ceasing, and even wage war, with 
intermissions only resulting from exhaustion? 
How strange are the times in which we live ! The 
coming spring season , on one side of the Atlantic, 
will open on a general conflict, waged to obtain, 
through whatever indirection, just such a system 
as ours; and on this side of the Atlantic, within 
the same parallels of latitude, it will open on 
fraternal war, waged in a moment of frenzied 
: discontent to overthrow and annihilate the same 
j institutions. Do men, indeed, live only for them- 
selves, to revenge their own wrongs, or to gratify 
their own ambition ? Rather do not men live 
least of all for themselves, and chiefly for pos- 
terity and for their fellow-men ? Have the Amer- 
ican people, then, become all of a sudden unnat- 
; ural, as well as unpatriotic? and will they disinherit 
their children of the precious estate held only in 
' trust for them, and deprive the world of the best 
hopes it has enjoyed since the human race began 
! its slow and painful, yet needful and wisely- 
J appointed progress? 

j Here I might close my plea for the American 
1 Union; but it is necessary, if not to exhaust the 
I argument, at least to exhibit the whole case. The 
disunionists, consciously unable to stand on their 
; mere disappointment in the recent election, have 
attempted to enlarge their ground. More than 
j thirty years there has existed a considerable — 
though not heretofore a formidable — mass of citi- 
zens in certain States situate near or around the^.. 
'delta of the Mississippi, who believe that the** 
I Union is less conducive to the welfare and great- 
ness of those States than a smaller confederacy, 
embracing only slave States, would be. This 
I class has availed itself of the discontents result- 
jing from the election to put into operation the 
■machinery of dissolution long ago prepared and 
I waiting only for occasion. In other States there 
is a soreness because of the want of sympathy 
in the free States with the efforts of slaveholders 
for the recapture of fugitives from service. In all 
j the slave States there is a restiveness resulting 
■from the resistance which has been so determ- 
inedly made within the last few years, in the free 
States, to the extension of slavery in the common 
I Territories of the United States. The Republican 
i party, which cast its votes for the successful pres- 
idential candidate on the ground of that policy, 
has been allowed, practically, no representation, 
i no utterance by speech or through the press, in 
I the slave States; while its policy, principles, and 
sentiments, and even its temper, have been so 
misrepresented as to excite apprehensions that it 
denies important constitutional obligations, and 
aims even at interference with slavery and its over- 
; throw by State authorities or intervention of the 
i Federal Government. Considerable masses even 
in the free States, interested in the success of these 
misrepresentations as a means of partisan strat- 
I egy, have lent their sympathy to the party claim- 
ling to be aggrieved. While the result of the 
election brings the Republican party necessarily 
i in to the foreground in resisting disunion, the preju- 
dices against them which I have described have 
deprived them of the cooperation of many good 



;/ 



and patriotic citizens. On a complex issue be- of persons, or any others recently coming from 
tween the Republican party and the disunionists, jor resident in other States, and which laws coh- 
although it involves the direst national calamities, | travene the Constitution of the United States, or 
the resliltmight be doubtful; for the Republican M any law of Congress passed in conformity thereto, 
party is weak in a large part of the Union. But ; ought to be repealed. 



on a direct issue, with all who cherish the Union 
on one side, and all who desire its dissolution by 
force on the other, the verdict would be prompt 
and almost unanimous. I desire thus to simplify 
the issue, and for that purpose to separate from 
it all collateral questions, and relieve itof all par- 
tisan passions and prejudices. 

I consider the idea of the withdrawal of the 



Secondly. Experience inpublicaffairshascon- 
firmed my opinion, that domestic slavery, exist- 
ing in any State, is wisely left by the Constitu- 
tion of the United Slates exclusively to the care, 
management, and disposition of that State; and 
if it were in my power, I would not alter the Con- 
stitution in that respect. If misapprehension of 
my position needs so strong a remedy, I am \yill- 



Gulf States, and their permanent reorganization j| ing to vote for an amendment of theConstilution 
with or without others in a distinct Confederacy i; declaring that it shall not, by any future amend- 
as a means of advantage to themselves, so cer- ment, be so altered as to confer on Congress a 
tainly unwise and so obviously impossible of ex- j power to abolish or interfere with slavery in any 
ecution, when the purpose is understood, that I j State. 

dismiss it with the discussion I have already jj Thirdly. While I think that Congress has 
incidentally bestowed upon it. 

The case is different, however, in regard to the 



exclusive and sovereign authority to legislate on 
all subjects whatever, in the common Territories 
of the United States; and while 1 ;<!^*'"^~' *'"'' 
never, directly or indirectly, give m] 
tablish or sanction slavery in such 
or anywhere else in the world, yet 
tion what constitutional laws shall at ai 
passed in regard to the Territories, is, like" 




other subjects which I have brought in this con 
nection before the Senate. 

Beyond a doubt. Union is vitally important to 
the Republican citizens of the United States; but 
it is just as important to the whole people. Re- 
publicanism and Union arc, therefore, not con- . , ^, 

vertible terms. Republicanism is subordinate to 1 other question, to be determined on practical 

Union, as everything else is and ought to be— i , grounds. 1 voted for enabling acts in the cases 

Republicanism, Democracy, every other politi-;; of Oregon, Minnesota, and Kansas, \yithout 

■, cal name and thing; all arc subordinate— and : i being able to secure in them such provisions as 

'■ ■' ^y ought to disappear in the presence of the Ij I would have preferred; and yet I voted wisely. 

fjat question of Union. So fur as I am con- j; So now, I am well satisfied that, under existing 
:ned, it shall be so; it should be so if the [; circumstances, a happy and satisftictoiy solu 
estion were sure to be tried as it ought onlylilionof the difficulties in the remaining Territo 



. ^ ilyl 

be determined, by the peaceful ordeal of theijries would be obtained by similar laws, pro- 
ballot. It shall be so all the more since there j , viding for their organization, if such organiza- 
is on one side preparedness to refer it to the arbi-j I tion were otherwise practicable. If, therefore, 
trament of civil war. I have such faith in this j; Kansas were admitted as a State, under the Wy- 
republican system of ours, that there is no polit- j andotte constitution, as I think she ought to be, 
iail good which I desire that I am not content to i and if the organic laws of all the other lerrito- 
seek through its peaceful forms of administration '; ries could be repealed, I could vote to authorize 
without invoking revolutionary action. If others 1 the organization and admission of two newStates 
shall invoke that form of action to oppose and] which should include them, reserving the right to 
overthrow Government, they shall not, so far as [ 
it depends on me, have the excuse that I obsli 



nalcly left myself to be misunderstood. In such 
a case I can afford to meet prejudice with concil- 
iation, exaction with concession which surren- 
ders no principle, and violence with the right hand 
of peace. Therefore, sir, so far as the abstract 
question whether, by the Constitution of the Uni 



effect subdivisions of them whenever necessary 
into several convenient States; but I do not find 
that such reservations could be constitutionally 
made. Without them, the ulterior embarrass- 
ments which would result from the hasty incor- 
poration of States of such vast extent and various 
interests and character would outweigh all the 
immediate advantages of such a measure. But 



led States, the bondsman, who is made such by if the measure were practicable, 1 should preter 
the laws of a State, is still a man or only prop-' a different course, namely: when the eccentric 
erty, I answer that, within that State, its laws on i, movements of secession and disunion shall nave 
that subject arc supreme; that when he has es- j ended, in whatever form that end may come, and 
capcd from that State into another, the Constitu-i the angry excitements of the hour shall have sub- 
lion regards him as a bondsman who may not, by ' sided, and calmness once more sha 1 have resumed 




subject, so as not to oblige private per^^..^ w^ — , - ., 

sistin their execution, and to protect freemen from i ought to be made. A Republican now-as I have 
being, by abuse of the laws, carried into slavery,! heretofore been a member of other parties exist- 
I agi-ec that all laws of the States, whether free :^ ing in my day-I neverthe ess hold and cherish. 
States or slave States, which relate to this class ' as I have always done, the principle that this 



8 



Government exists in its present form only by 
the consent of the governed, and that it is as ne- 
cessiiry as it is wise, to resort to the people for re- 
visions of the organic lawwlien the troubles and 
dangers of the State certainly transcend the pow- 
ers delegated by it to the public authorities. Nor 
ought the suggestion to excite surprise. Govern- 
ment in any form is a machine; this is the most 
complex one that the mind •f man has ever in- 
vented, or the hand of man has ever framed. Per- 
fect as It is, it ought to be expected that it will, 
at least as often as once in a century, require 
some modification to adapt it to the changes of 
.society and alternations of empire. 

Fourthly. I hold myself ready now, as always 
heretofore, to vote for any properly-guarded laws 
which shall be deemed necessary to prevent mu- 
tual invasions of States by citizens of oilier States, 
and punish those who shall aid and abet them. 

Fifthly. Notwithstanding the arguments of the 
Senator from Oregon, [General L.\ne,] 
that [ihysical bonds, such 
xilroads, rivers, and canals, are 
/powerful for holding civil commu- 
_^_ icr than any mere covenants, though 
(.♦parchment or engraved upon iron. 1 
therefore, constant to my purpose to se- 
cure, if possible, the construction of two Pacific 
railways, one of which shall connect the ports 
around the mouths of the Mississippi, and the 
other the towns on the Missouri and the Lakes, 
with the harbors on our western coast. 

If, in the expression of these views, I have not 
proposed what is desired or expected by many 
others, they will do me the justice to believe that 
I am as far from having suggested what in many 
respects would have been in harmony with cher- 
ished convictions of my own. I learned early 
from Jefferson, that in political affairs we cannot 
always do what seems to us absolutely best. 
Those with whom we must necessarily act, enter- 
taining dillerent views, have the power and the 
right of carrying them iiito practice. We must 
be content to lead when we can, and to follow 
when we cannot lead; and if we cannot at any 
time do for our country all the good that we 
would wish, we must be satisfied with doing for 
her all the good that we can. '\ 




Having submitted my own opinions on this 
great crisis, it remains only to say that I shall 
cheerfully lend to the Government my best sup- 
port in whatever prudent yet energetic efforts 
it shall make to preserve the public peace, and 
to maintain and preserve the Union; advising, 
only, that it practice as far as possible the 
utmost moderation, forbearance, and concilia- 
tion. 

And now, Mr. President, what are the auspices 
of the country ? I know that we arc in the midst 
of alarms, and somewiiat exposed to accidents 
unavoidable in seasons of tempestuous passions. 
We already have disorder; and violence has begun. 
I know not to what extent it may go. Still my 
faith in the Constitution and in the Union abides, 
because my faith in the wisdom and virtue of tVie 
American people remains unshaken. Coolness, 
calmness, and resolution, are elements of their 
character. They have been temporarily displaced ; 
but they arc reappearing. Soon enough, i ti-uet, 
for safety, it will be seen that sedition and '.io- 
lence are only local and temporary, and that loy- 
alty and affection to the Union are the natural 
sentiments of the whole country. Whatever dan- 
gers there shall be, there will be the determina- 
tion to meet them; whatever sacrifices, privateer 
public, shall be needful for the Union, they will be 
made. I feel sure that the hour has not come for 
this great nation to fall. This people, which has 
been studying to become wiser and better as ifj 
has grown older, is not perverse or wicked enough 
to deserve so dreadful and severe a ptinishmc 
as dissolution. This Union has not yet accoJ 
plished what good, for mankind was manifest! 
designed by Him who appoints the seasons anj 
prescribes the duties of States and empires Nol 
sir; if it were cast down by faction to-day, it' 
would rise again and reappear in all its ma'cstic 
proportions to-morrow. It istheonly Government 
that can stand here. Woe ! Woe ! to the man that 
madly liflfe his hand against it. It shall continue 
and endure; and men, in after times, shall declare 
that this generation, which saved the Union from 
such sudden and unlooked-for dangers, surpas.^ed 
in magnanimity even that one which laid it."? 
foundatiotis in the eternal principles of liberty, 
justice, and humanity. 



Printed at the office of the Congressional Globe 



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